[1440] The turquoise mines of Cerillos, in the Sandia Mountains, are about twenty miles west of Pecos. Bandelier’s Visit, pp. 39, 115.
[1441] Bandelier (Historical Introduction, p. 22) places Tutahaco in the vicinity of Isleta, on the Rio Grande, in opposition to Davis’s opinion (Spanish Conquest, p. 180) that it was at Laguna. Coronado subsequently sent an officer southward to explore the country, who reached a place some eighty leagues distant, where the river disappeared in the earth, and on his way discovered four other villages. (Castañeda, p. 140.) These, Bandelier places near Socorro. (Ibid., p. 24.) General Simpson (Coronado’s March, p. 323, note) discusses the question of the disappearance of the river.
[1442] Castañeda (Relation, p. 101) says the siege terminated at the close of 1542; but it is clear, from the course of the narrative, that it must have been early in 1541.
[1443] All the authorities agree in identifying Chia with the modern pueblo of Cia, or Silla, and in placing Quirex in the Queres district of Cochití, Santo Domingo, etc.
[1444] Letter of Coronado to the Emperor Charles the Fifth; Ternaux-Compans, vol. ix. p. 356. Castañeda (Relation, p. 113) says it was on May 5.
[1445] General J. H. Simpson (Coronado’s March, p. 336) has given the reasons for regarding this river as the Gallinas, which is a tributary of the Pecos.
[1446] Jaramillo (Relation p. 374) says that this was “much nearer New Spain;” but Castañeda (Relation, p. 120) makes them to have passed by this very village.
[1447] In his Letter to Charles V. (p. 358), Coronado states that having marched forty-two days after parting from the main body of his force, he arrived at Quivira in about sixty-seven days (p. 359). This gives twenty-five days for accomplishing the distance to the point of separation, instead of thirty-seven, as stated by Castañeda (Relation, pp. 127, 134), who estimates that they had travelled two hundred and fifty leagues from Tiguex, marching six or seven leagues a day, as measured by counting their steps.
[1448] Letter to Charles V., p. 360. There is a great difference of opinion as to the situation of Quivira. The earlier writers, Gallatin, Squier, Kern, Abert, and even Davis, have fallen into the error of fixing it at Gran Quivira, about one hundred miles directly south of Santa Fé, where are to be seen the ruins of a Franciscan Mission founded subsequently to 1629. See Diary of an excursion to the ruins of Abo, Quarra, and Gran Quivira, in New Mexico, 1853, by Major J. H. Carleton (Smithsonian Report, 1854, p. 296). General Simpson, however, (Coronado’s March, p. 339) argues against this view, and maintains that Coronado “reached the fortieth degree of latitude, or what is now the boundary line between the States of Kansas and Nebraska, well on toward the Missouri River.” Judge Savage believes that he crossed the plains of Kansas and came out at a point much farther west, upon the Platte River. Proceedings of American Antiquarian Society, April, 1881, p. 240. Prince (History of New Mexico, p. 141) thinks that “Coronado traversed parts of the Indian Territory and Kansas, and finally stopped on the borders of the Missouri, somewhere between Kansas City and Council Bluffs.” Judge Prince, who is President of the Hist. Society of New Mexico, adds that it would be impossible from what Castañeda tells us, to determine the position of Quivira with certainty. Bandelier (Historical Introduction, p. 25) is not satisfied that he reached as far northeast as General Simpson states, and believes that he moved more in a circle.
[1449] Jaramillo (Relation, p. 377) says “it was about the middle of August;” but according to Castañeda (Relation, p. 141), Coronado got back to Tiguex in August.